TV: Fox’s ‘Bless the Harts’ laughs with instead of lampooning North Carolina

Hunter Ingram More Content Now

Monday

Sep 23, 2019 at 11:53 AM

LOS ANGELES - For years, Emily Spivey has written everything as if it was set in the South. She just didn’t tell anybody.

As an Emmy winner for her work on “Saturday Night Live” and writer on shows such as “Parks and Recreation” and “Modern Family,” Spivey has taken that secret to great heights.

But this fall, the North Carolina native is finally dropping the veil and telling the story she was literally born to write.

Spivey’s latest creation is Fox’s new animated comedy series “Bless the Harts” (premiering 8:30 p.m. Sept. 29), a tender-hearted laugh factory about a lovable but cash-strapped Southern family making ends meet by any thrifty means necessary.

The show, which features the voice talents of Kristen Wiig and Maya Rudolph, is the rare Southern-fried comedy that doesn’t rely on laughing at the accents and antics of its subjects just because of their geographic upbringing.

Spivey wants you to laugh with the Harts, not at them.

“You know growing up in the south, you get so sick of the dumb hick sterotype and the ‘Hee-Haw’ of it all,” she said while promoting the series at the Television Critics Association press tour in Los Angeles.

“I just wanted to create a quirky Southern family that was authentic and based on people I grew up with. I want you to recognize these people.”

In the Hart family, there’s Jenny (Wiig), the resourceful matriarch who hustles to support her family; her scratch lottery ticket-loving mother Betty (Rudolph); her creative and introverted daughter Violet (Jillian Bell); and her chronically optimistic boyfriend, Wayne (Ike Barinholtz).

The Harts aren’t looking for fame and fortune, though they wouldn’t give back if it was left on their doorstep. They are just looking for a slice of the American Dream that keeps them afloat and happy.

With a license to finally write what she knows, Spivey said she’s found her own slice of that dream.

“It is heaven on earth for me,” she said. “I’m just getting to write about what I always wanted to write about, which is my hometown. I’m the most homesick person.”

Her roots run deep in North Carolina. She grew up in High Point. Her sister is a minister in Troutman. Her husband has family from Wilmington.

She even infuses her animated world with some touches from her home state, even though the show itself is set in the general South. The town at the center of story is named Greenpoint, a nod to two North Carolina towns - Greensboro and High Point.

“Bless the Harts” will join animated legends like “The Simpsons” and “Family Guy” on Fox’s Animation Domination Sunday lineup, but Spivey had other trailblazers in mind when she started writing the series.

“I really wanted to do a show in the tradition of ‘King of the Hill’ and ‘The Andy Griffith Show,’ where it is just very humane and gentle, but funny,” she said. “I hope that comes through when people watch it.”

Spivery worked on “King of the Hill” as well.With the reins to finally bring the South she knows and loves to the screen - with the help of animated maestros like executive producers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (“The Lego Movie,” “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse”) - Spivey said she is ready to deploy all the qualities that she believes make it a special corner of the world.

“I think there is a soulfulness to North Carolina,” she said. “I think people have a good sense of humor, and southerners, specifically North Carolinians, are good storytellers. .. I just adore it and I’m ready to share with everyone else.”Reporter Hunter Ingram can be reached at Hunter.Ingram@StarNewsOnline.com. Hunter is a member of the Television Critics Association.